I was told ‘it will be very hard’, ‘you won’t find a board willing to take the risk’ or ‘why not try a bigger fundraising role?’ But why? I knew I wanted to be a chief executive. It’s where my skills lie and it’s what I wanted to do. Essentially I just didn’t fit into the headhunters’ box.

I'm a charity chief executive with no job security

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I fell into fundraising early in my voluntary sector career and, as it happened, I was pretty good at it. I loved my role but I knew it wasn’t where I wanted to end up.

This was even more clear when I noticed just how rubbish so many chief executives are at making an ask, networking a room, understanding or even valuing how vital it is to bring money into the organisation – or even that it’s a key part of their job. When so many charity leaders fail to ‘get’ fundraising, shouldn’t we be aiming for more of us to influence from the top down and not just the bottom up?

I spent 18 months applying for chief executive roles – I don’t know how many interviews I did where I got to second place, on each occasion mentally leaving my job, spending hours preparing presentations and picking myself up afterwards when the rejection call came through. The answer I received – the board would not take a risk on an unproven fundraising, female chief executive.

Eventually, I finally found a board that was open-minded enough to take that risk. Riding the rollercoaster of government cuts meant as soon as I became a chief executive, I needed to diversify income streams, to do more with less and find innovative sources of new funding. It meant being hands-on with funding bids – always attending when potential funders asked to interview the charity and understanding how to pitch and to whom.

The voluntary sector is facing huge demand for services at the moment. Income is being cut and there is increasing competition for the resources that are available. This is putting real pressure on chief executives to sustain income levels – which is why it’s vital that they understand and provide leadership in the development of fundraising strategies.

Confessions of a charity professional – we want your blogs

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Now, seven years later, my next battle has begun – moving from a small to a large charity. I know this will bring different challenges, but I’ve lived through funding cuts, mergers, volunteer rebellion, redundancies and crisis. I also know that the skills I have learned through this are transferable skills – crisis management, keeping a calm head in stormy waters, the ability to change direction quickly, not being afraid of making difficult decisions, letting people go, changing strategy, reinventing the charity, monitoring finances forensically and keeping staff motivated. Basically being a leader and that’s all it is about.

Do boards of trustees understand that? I don’t think so. Most boards have very little idea of how their charities run on a day-to-day basis, so they choose like for like, appoint another ‘adequate’ chief executive instead of taking a risk. I’m hoping I will find the exception – a board who will take a punt on this ambitious, female, fundraising chief executive who wants to take their charity to the next level of success.